She is married to John Patrick Lowrie, also a voice actor who has done extensive work with Valve, and it was he who encouraged her to get into voice-over work. Her training on the stage - and, most importantly, her skill in acting and singing - made her perfectly suited to play the character of GLaDOS, a role which has brought her great praise.

In addition to continuing to work in theatrical productions, she is now a permanent member of the Valve repertory, having appeared in all of their games since Half-Life 2. Surprisingly, and despite her popularity and critical acclaim, she's done little voice acting outside of her work with Valve.

She and Lowrie have been far more active in the convention circuit as of late, appearing all over the United States (and even in the UK) since the summer of 2011. McLain continues to appear in Video Games, and is gradually spreading her wings beyond Valve; it has been confirmed that she will appear in the new game by the creators of Space Quest (along with Lowrie) due to their sharing the same agent.

Tropes for Ellen McLain:

Actor Allusion: She's clearly doing the GLaDOS voice as the AI in Pacific Rim. This is intentional, as director Guillermo del Toro is a huge Valve fan (as are his kids), and asked special permission to use the character's distinctive (i.e. copyrightable) quirks in his film. Valve even gave him the proprietary voice filter techniques to do GLaDOS perfectly, though he ended up using something a bit more original.

The Cast Showoff: Yes, she really can sing. (Voice acting is actually a side job to her singing career.)

Money, Dear Boy: She's made no bones about the fact that she's in voice acting for the money. That doesn't stop her from feeling creatively fulfilled when she hits upon the right role, of course.

Shout-Out: Unfailingly sings the praises of the following people working on Portal 2, in every interview she gives: Bill van Buren (producer); Erik Wolpaw, Chet Faliszek, and Jay Pinkerton (writers); and Mike Morasky (composer). She apparently did this so much in her Portal 2 commentary that it was shelved for fear of seeming too self-congratulatory on the part of Valve.

Tough Act to Follow: invoked She and everyone at Valve very much felt this way about the original Portal while they were making the sequel.

Word of St. Paul: Because she was made privy to the story of Portal 2 throughout its development, she's been able to confirm or denyfan theories. For example, she's the one who officially revealed that Caroline is the woman in the picture with Cave Johnson.

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